Neopets: Year 9

Year 9 has been a year of major change; we’ve seen this site do a complete flip-around into a brand new Neopets. And like the Giant Meepit told us many months ago, we were truly unprepared.

This year, like every other year on Neopets, there were many new Flash Games released; in fact, there have been 27 new Neopets flash games released this year. Also many of the old games were updated. From the exciting, adventurous Lost in Space Fungus to the puzzle of Roodoku, the flash games have added something special to the year like nothing else can.

In Year 8, multiple secret avatars were released each month, but in Year 9 we saw a definite decrease in the amount released. Though not as many secret avatars were released this year as were other years, there were still four released. The Bonju Avatar continued to remain unseen throughout the year, adding a mystery for the Avatar Collectors out there: “Where is the Bonju Avatar, and will we ever get it?”

There were also countless numbers of new items and graphics released this year. The new items included clothes, potions, toys, and anything else you can think of. New items continue to bring to Neopets the fun and excitement of a real-world market, and continue to teach us of the workings of money and trade.

Year 9 has also had a fair share of new Neopet colors released. Starting with the two Aisha colors released on Aisha day early in the year, all the way to the Christmas Grarrl released a few days before Christmas, there have been a total of 113 new Neopets colors. These new colors have also given us countless new ways to transform our pets to our personal likings. Though there weren’t any new species released this year, like previous years, there was a new Paint Brush. The Zombie Paint Brush was released on October 25, and can already paint three different species of Neopets.

Many events happened this year on Neopets. Randomly dedicated days such as Evil Twin Day and Frozen Day, and annual festivals such as the Chocolate Ball and Usikicon gave us some excitement in between the major holidays and events. But the biggest events of Year 9 were the Second Altador Cup and the two Games Master Challenges. We watched the Altador Cup progress as our individual teams moved up (or down) in the rankings and we saw the Darigan Citadel claim their victory in the end. And we all took on the “all powerful” Games Master, and many of us came out on top. Some other major events that went on this year were the plots. From the end of the Tale of Woe in January to the Journey to the Lost Isle, Year 9 has seen its share of Neopian adventures. And for those who missed either plot, the Altador Plot is still going on today.

Of course, this past year things were released like every other year, things that were needed to make playing on the site fun and safe for everyone. But the big news of the year was what was done above and beyond what was expected; I’m talking of course about the new site layout and Customisation features.

This year’s new features included the Site Layout, which though it was tricky at first, we’ve no doubt all become accustomed to it. The new layout has given Neopets a more modern and better looking style. It is also easier to navigate through the site, which makes playing on Neopets more fun and less frustrating. Also, Neopets Customisation has brought a whole new spin on how we interact with our pets. The Customisation Feature allows us to create a pet any way that we like; we can now combine paint brush clothes and make our very own new style. To make the Customisation feature even more fun, the Neopets staff created the Customisation spotlight, so now we can put our styling skills up against other Neopians and see who comes up on top.

This year we’ve been given many new ways to customize our pets, like the many new clothes and of course the new NC Mall. The NC Mall has given us the ability to use our real-world money to interact on the virtual site. It has given the users with less knowledge of ways to make neopoints a way to still have fun customizing their pets.

To keep up with the demanding need for entertainment across the world Neopets also released the Neovision feature, which allows us to make our own movies and enter them for others to watch. To go along with this, the Neopets Staff also created the Neovision contest which allows us to put our videos in differently themed competitions throughout the year.

Some new features that were less dynamic but still helpful were the ability to accept or reject items sent to us, pet rating, and giving our Neopets emotions. Accepting or rejecting items helped crack down on the troubles that were happening through duplicated items and such. Pet rating allows us to see what others think of what we have done with our pets; through customisation and painting pets we can strive to bring our pet’s rating up. With Neopet emotions, we can see how our Neopet feels by just glancing at it. This along with other new features allow us to interact with our pets in a whole new way. Though the new features were a huge part of the change, other things like these added to the new Neopets.

So truly Year 9 was a year of major change on Neopets. From the smallest changes to the biggest this year has definitely enhanced our time on Neopets. The new Neopets was a change for the better, I believe. Though some people complained and some left, many people took on this new change and now understand it to be how Neopets is and will be in the future. We all look forward to Year 10 on Neopets, the start of a whole new decade of the same Neopets, but with a new look.

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